One thing is clear about the 2003 Southeastern Conference basketball season — second-ranked Kentucky is the team to beat.
The Wildcats, holders of the nation’s longest active streak at 14 straight games, are a perfect 10-0 in conference and are two whole games ahead of the nearest competitor in the East, the Florida Gators.
Kentucky has not tasted defeat since a Dec. 28 loss to Louisville. It has won with relative ease during the streak, beating opponents by an average of 15.7 points per game during the hot streak.
Two of the Wildcats’ wins came against two former No. 1 ranked teams.
Kentucky beat Alabama in Tuscaloosa, Ala., 63-46, and defeated Florida in Lexington, Ky., 70-55.
The Gators, who were No. 1 when they fell to the Wildcats, fell two games behind Kentucky when they lost to up-and-coming Tennessee on Saturday in Knoxville, Tenn., 66-59.
The road will not get any easier for Florida, as it must face Georgia, Auburn and Kentucky before the start of the SEC Tournament.
The Volunteers, led by back-to-back SEC Player of the Week honoree and the league’s leading scorer at 21.8 points per game, Ron Slay, are virtually assured of an invitation to the NCAA Tournament with its defeat of the Gators.
Tennessee is on a six-game winning streak and sits three games behind Kentucky with a 7-3 conference mark.
The Bulldogs of Georgia have a 6-4 conference record after starting 4-1 in the SEC and are struggling on the road in conference play. Georgia has won just one of the five games it has played away from Athens, Ga.
Rounding out the bottom in the East are Vanderbilt and South Carolina, who are 3-8 [before Wednesday’s games] and 3-7 in conference, respectively.
The picture is a little more muddled for the participants in the West.
Auburn, who many media prognosticators picked to finish last in the SEC, currently resides in first in the West.
The orange and blue Tigers are 6-4 in the SEC and 17-6 on the season, led by Marquis Daniels, who averages 18.6 points per game.
Mississippi State pulled even with Auburn last weekend, defeating Ole Miss in Starksville, Miss., while Auburn fell to Alabama.
After starting 0-3 in the conference, MSU has reeled off six wins in its last seven conference games, including blowout victories over Arkansas and Vanderbilt and an overtime win against Ole Miss in its last three games.
Senior Mario Austin is playing the way the MSU faithful expected him to play this season after early season NCAA eligibility problems and a minor knee injury. Austin averages 16.9 points and 8.3 rebounds per game.
Other than MSU and Auburn, there are no other West teams with a winning record.
Alabama, who at one time was the top rated team in the country, is in a slump at the wrong time of the year- the stretch run before NCAA Tournament bids are given out.
The Crimson Tide are mired in a losing streak, dropping five of their last seven conference games and are 0-6 on the road for the season.
But their 84-68 win over Auburn last weekend may get the Crimson Tide back in contention for a NCAA Tournament bid.
Senior Erwin Dudley was named to the Wooden Top 30 list, which consists of 30 players making bids to win the National Player of the Year Award.
Ole Miss is another team experiencing some losing ways, dropping six games in a row after starting the conference slate with a 3-2 record.
LSU also sits at 3-8, while Arkansas remains 2-8.